Monthly Archives: March 2009

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James Wisniewski: On His Time With The Ducks… “Coming to a new team like this there was a little adjustment for one, to play with a guy like Scott Niedermayer, and get put in a role where they want you to succeed and have a lot of responsibility and shut teams down. And also provide some offense on the power play as well.”

On The Stretch… “Just one game at a time. Forget about this game. You learn from the things you did wrong but you also look at the things you did right. Getting it in deep, sticking to your gameplan and making sure little bad habits don’t creep into your game. Right now it’s a perfect time to go on streaks like this. You want to be going into the playoffs at your peak.”

Corey Perry: “Tonight was huge for us, with the playoff race we are in with Nashville, Edmonton, Minnesota, Dallas. Every two points count, every point counts. That’s our goal for the rest of the season, see how far we can get and see how far up the standings we can climb.”

On Tonight’s Game… “It was just one of those nights. We were shooting the puck and they were going in the net. Playing our game and we were getting some favorable bounces, which hasn’t really happened in a while. It’s just one of those nights but you can’t depend on that every night. It comes from hard work and that’s what we have to do.”

Just when you thought the Ducks were incapable of blowing anyone out, a 7-2 win over the worst team in the league comes three days after a 6-2 win over the second-worst team in the league. The sort of results you’d expect from a playoff-bound team — also the sort that builds confidence along with a fifth straight victory.

The win leaves the Ducks in seventh place in the Western Conference standings (80 points), at least until the eighth-place Oilers (79 points) play the Phoenix Coyotes tomorrow.

They also managed to spread the wealth rather well: Corey Perry scored twice and Erik Christensen, Teemu Selanne, Andrew Ebbett, Rob Niedermayer and Petteri Nokelainen scored once each. Playing time also was dispensed liberally late in the blowout, which was good news for workhorse defensemen Chris Pronger and Scott Niedermayer; both played fewer than 20 minutes.

Points are at a premium, both teams are in desperation mode. We’re fortunate enough to steal an extra point in theshoot out. They beat us in Anaheim earlier this year on a 4-on-4 goal andHamhuisscored on our first visit here. We won the last one in Anaheim on aTeemuSelannepowerplay goal. It’s been a very close this year against both hockey clubs and it’s been very competitive.

A shootout win in favor of the Ducks in Memphis means a sticky standings logjam for the number 8 playoff seed: Both teams are tied with exactly 78 points and nine games remaining. Let the playoff battle begin!

Drew Miller scored in regulation, Teemu Selanne scored the only goal in the shootout, and Jean-Sebastien Giguere (in his strongest effort in months) stopped 35 of 36 shots, including all four he saw in the shootout.

Defenseman Francois Beauchemin was in full gear Friday for his first practice with teammates since tearing his left ACL in November. Most notable were his stops and starts and shots from close range, which had him looking like the Beauchemin of old.